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Parents want to see Germantown Elementary School updated, but plans to tear down and rebuild the school have them worried about the loss of a small school atmosphere, increases in local traffic and plans to bus students to Rockville during the two-year construction process.

Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Jerry D. Weast announced in May the school system would spend $49,050 on a replacement feasibility study for the aging school building. Germantown Elementary was built in 1935 and renovated in 1978.

The school will either be torn down and rebuilt, added on to or left alone in favor of building a new school at a new site. Each of these plans is intended to relieve crowding at Matsunaga and Great Seneca Creek elementary schools.

Matsunaga was built in 2001 for 659 students, but 1,015 children were enrolled this past year. The school is home to 12 of the Northwest Cluster's 26 portable classrooms. Great Seneca Creek exceeds its capacity by 86 students, according to the school system's 2011 Capital Improvement Plan.

Germantown, on the other hand, was built to accommodate 88 more students than were enrolled in 2009-10.

The feasibility study will look at new school buildings to hold as many as 740 students, more than doubling the current enrollment of 273. The existing school is about 57,000 square feet. The new building would be 90,000 square feet.

Nelton Castro, cluster representative for the school, thinks the Germantown expansion would do little to alleviate crowding in the area.

"It doesn't seem like the population and development are going to slow down any time soon," he said. "Why do something that's just a Band-Aid? This barely alleviates the problem and we'll have to redistrict."

Several Germantown Elementary parents who have attended the feasibility study meetings said they supported the construction of a new school but had doubts about plans to shutter the site completely for two years, busing students to Rockville for classes each day.

"It's scary. If we can sell our house and get out of the boundaries we're in, we'll do that," said Jim Hook, 39, a chiropractor with a son in kindergarten at the school and a younger daughter. "I know people who have moved and other people who are thinking about it. It's something people are seriously considering."

Jennie Woo, a math teacher at Gaithersburg Middle School with a son at the school and a younger daughter, also is unhappy about the plan to bus her children.

"I don't like it, absolutely," she said. "I live here so he can walk to school or I can take him. An hour-long bus ride is very different from what I wanted."

A new school would be attractive to teachers, Woo said, and would help alleviate the traffic that backs up onto Liberty Mill and Dawson Farm roads at the beginning and end of the school day.

Germantown PTA President Kimmi Photonakis did not want to comment on her feelings about the restructuring plans, but said other parents were concerned about increasing the student population.

"Our community loves our current small school and everything about it," she said.

Adrienne Karamihas, a district planner in charge of this project, said plans for the Germantown site still are preliminary. The facility planning group will decide its three preferred blueprints at its final meeting July 21. Architects will then create brochures outlining the plans, pros and cons, and costs of each to present to the school board.

The school board has the final say on how, when and where to build a new school, Karamihas said.

The board also will address parents' concerns about busing during the two-year construction period she said.

"The feasibility study we're doing now is to look at the replacement of Germantown Elementary School. Any other concerns will be addressed in a separate venue. We are aware of the concerns of the parents."

If you go

What: Final Germantown Elementary Facilities Advisory Committee meeting

When: 7 p.m. July 21

Where: Germantown Elementary School, 19110 Liberty Mill Road, Germantown

Details

The school's Facility Advisory Committee has hosted two meetings to examine possible blueprints for the new school. The architectural firm Grieves, Worrall, Wright and O'Hatnick was chosen to come up with architectural renderings and engineering services. The options so far include:

A two story building with courtyards. The plans call for a gymnasium and multi-purpose room in separate areas of the building, which some parents would like to see closer together.

A two-story H-shaped schoolhouse. The facilities committee asked the architect to change these plans to bring the middle bar of the building forward.

A two-story T-shaped building, presented for the first time May 27.